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If it's your ambition to be the chairman of a large company, now is your chance to assess your potential. In this simulation, you adopt the role of chairman of L-Air, an airline which starts up business with £3 million. You have 7 year s to increase your net assets to the £30 million necessary to take over British Airways! You have to decide on the number of aircraft to operate, whether to buy or charter the level of staffing and maintenance necessary, the duration of fuel contracts and when to repay loans.

Problems encountered include tax demands, increases in fuel costs. and loss of revenue resulting from cancelled flights, strikes, hijacks, air crashes and sabotage.

The information is presented through histograms., bar charts and graphics. The first chart displayed is a bar chart showing a forecast of the passenger payload for each level of activity. Using this information, the player must decide on the best aircraft to use, and then finalise his choices after looking at the level of revenue expected. When this is above normal, it may be cheaper to borrow money and buy aircraft instead of chartering.

The market rate for each DC10 is £10 million, and when aircraft are purchased for more than this amount, the additional cost is debited against the capital reserves. thus reducing net assets. Crew costs are fixed at £50.000 per DC10 while the cost of maintenance is £90.000 for each aircraft. Results of trading are shown in the form of profit and loss accounts and balance sheets.

The graphics are excellent, and the player's interest is maintained throughout by the constantly changing information - you can even read Financial Times reports and receive Telex messages. If you succeed in reaching the target of £30 million. then perhaps Richard Branson may have a rival!

Control keys: clearly explained and kept as simple as possible
Keyboard play: very good
Graphics: sensible use of graphs and tables in most programs. The graphics in Airline are particularly good
Use of Colour: limited